Generally, various transporting devices can be used in order for example to transport substrates or other carriers in processing installations. For example, substrates can be transported by a transporting device through a vacuum process chamber, a negative pressure process chamber or an atmospheric pressure process chamber, so that the substrates can be processed, for example can be coated, within the vacuum process chamber, the negative pressure process chamber or the atmospheric pressure process chamber.
Furthermore, a coating process may be carried out in a process chamber in such a way that the substrates are coated at a high coating rate (for example at over approximately 1 μm·m/min, for example at over approximately 5 μm·m/min, for example at a coating rate in a range of approximately 1 μm·m/min to approximately 10 μm·m/min), while the substrates pass through the coating region of the process chamber at a predefined transporting speed. In the case of such high-rate coating processes, it is possible for internal components in the process chamber, such as for example the transporting device or parts of the transporting device, to become so thickly coated that the functioning of the internal components, for example the transporting device, may be impaired on account of the undesired coating.
For example, in the case of such high-rate coating processes it is possible for several grams of coating material, for example over 10 g or over 15 g, to be deposited on a substrate or used up in the coating process for one substrate. Consequently, in the course of a lengthy coating procedure, in which for example over 1,000 or over 10,000 substrates are coated one after the other, several kilograms of coating material may be deposited in the process chamber and/or on internal components (for example the transporting device) in the process chambers.
Furthermore, the substrates may be coated with materials that have a low evaporation temperature, for example an evaporation temperature in a range from approximately 500° C. to approximately 1500° C., for example an evaporation temperature in a range from approximately 600° C. to approximately 1400° C., for example an evaporation temperature in a range from approximately 600° C. to approximately 1000° C.